What You’ve Missed

Another Week Down

I love Groupon.

I think it’s just an awesome tool to discover, or rediscover, a city that you already live in. I am not sure who started this whole “online discount club” stuff, but kudos to that guy. When I was in New York I used Lifebooker a lot. Lifebooker is primarily for women and is mostly for discounts for hair salons and spa treatments. They used to send out emails for classes going on in the area like salsa, fitness, belly dance, makeup lessons, photography classes etc. but I noticed that ever since I moved to Atlanta my emails from them are scarce and only offer online deals. I guess they haven’t set up their market in Atlanta yet. I used to check out Living Social all the time too but their offers didn’t appeal to me as much as Lifebooker and Groupon so I sort of gave up on it. But, whenever Lorenzo and I want to find something to do, we always check Groupon to see if we can get a discount; that’s how I got him to take me to Studio Movie Grill (he probably would have taken me eventually, but I didn’t know the place existed until I saw it on Groupon). This week, we discovered Vino Venue and got a dinner deal there. I knew exactly where it was because it was in the same plaza as the supermarket we go to, but he’d never been there either so it was the perfect opportunity for us to try it out. Vino Venue is a wine school that also hosts wine tasting and cooking classes. The experience was nice, we got an entire bottle of wine, a cheese and cracker platter, and small plate to share. The food was great and we really enjoyed it.

We also got to go to one of the Falcon’s preseason games last week. One of Lorenzo’s friends had season tickets and wasn’t able to make the game. I had fun, even though I’m sure I would have enjoyed it more it were a Giants game, but beggars can’t be choosers. We are going to have to do something about this before the season starts; I don’t think I can handle missing all of the Giants’ games. The Sundays I have to spend at training are the worst. I started paying attention to football when both of my brothers played in high school; prior to that I was just a “fake fan”- only watching the Super Bowl for the commercials and half time shows. After they started playing, I really got into it, as did my sisters. So now we each have our own team and make it our business to try to not miss any games…no matter what the team. When my younger brother Kevin was a waiter at Friday’s, he worked out a deal with the manager to ensure that he’d have every Sunday off during the season. Yeah, it gets serious.

On the good news front, in the mist of my job search I was also looking into colleges where I can start my grad program, and was finally able to get somewhere with it. I was speaking to someone before I went to Annual Training, and was able to follow up once I got back. I went over to the school on Friday to show them some of my VA paperwork and was able to apply, get accepted, and enrolled in class all in the same afternoon. I just have to wait now for the VA to approve and pay the school. I’m super excited about it. Lorenzo was so proud of me he took me to the Palm to celebrate. I should be able to finish in 2 years if I take 2 classes a semester. So wish me luck!

Our Labor Day weekend went really slow. Lorenzo’s brother was supposed to come and spend the weekend with us be he ended up taking his son Pittsburg and promised to come another time. I wanted to go and visit one of his sisters in Florida, but because we thought his brother was coming we cancelled those plans. After lounging around for most of Sunday we went to visit Lorenzo’s friends Glen and Amber, who recently had son. Lorenzo hasn’t seen them since February, when the baby was born just to give them their space, but we finally got a chance to see them again. Glen’s mom and stepdad were visiting also and his mom was asking me a whole bunch of questions about who I was. I didn’t get offended because Lorenzo warned me about it. He and Glen went to college together and Glen’s mom has known Lorenzo since he was with his ex…so me being the “new girl” raises a whole bunch of questions about my identity. She asked me more about myself than his mom did. I thought that was funny. On Monday, we invited a bunch of Lorenzo’s friends over for helping him move in back in May. It was fun having them over, and I know it was important to Lorenzo to be able to show them some gratitude for helping him move. We got a bunch of wings from Buffalo Wild Wing, some other prepared foods from the grocery store, and I made turkey burgers from scratch. Those were a hit.

Lorenzo and I are talking about nothing but great things for the future. Even though we don’t have a wedding date or any solid plans yet, we are working together to build an excellent life for ourselves. We both are no strangers to hard work, so the plans we are making can bring nothing but great things. I’m looking forward to the challenge.